He silently, methodically anchored flags, newspaper clippings, signs, flowers and military regalia with bungee cords around the small flatbed in front of Town Hall.

But the memorial was missing one item.

The Roslindale father went to his truck and removed a folded American flag from his dashboard. He carried it with arms outstretched.

It was the flag they had placed on the coffin of his son, Marine Lance Cpl. Alexander Arredondo, 20, of Randolph, after he was killed in Iraq on Aug. 25, 2004.

Arredondo, who had heard of Preach’s death while at a funeral for another soldier killed in Iraq, laid the folded flag at the edge of the flatbed.

“When that hits you, it goes straight to your heart. Your heart blows apart,” Arredondo, 48, said of losing his son in combat.

Arredondo, now living in the Roslindale section of Boston, made national headlines when he broke down upon hearing that his son was dead. He set fire to the van that Marine officers had traveled in to tell him about his son’s death. He suffered burns on 26 percent of his body.

Since that time, he has been through counseling and become a vessel of support for other military families experiencing tragedy.

Since Jan. 1, Arredondo and his wife, Melida, have attended three wakes and funerals of soldiers killed in combat overseas. They said they learned of Preach’s death over the weekend while attending the funeral of Army Sgt. Kyle Harrington, 24, of Swansea, who died Jan. 24 in Iraq.

“Rather than lick our wounds, we try to do something to help someone else. That makes us feel better. It keeps us saner,” Melida Arredondo, 43, said.

Over in Raynham, it took one year for Paul Monti to attend a support group meeting of Gold Star families after his son, Army Sgt. 1st Class Jared C. Monti, was killed in action in Afghanistan on June 21, 2006, as he attempted to help two injured soldiers.

“I wasn’t sure I wanted to attend at first, you know. I was afraid it was going to be too emotional,” Monti, 62, said of the monthly meetings at the Veterans Affairs Medical Center in Brockton.

But once Monti started attending the meetings, he said he found some solace in discussions with other families from Brockton, Hull, Pembroke and Franklin, among other communities.

“It was a good thing to be able to talk to people there who had lost their kids,” Monti said.

Families of fallen soldiers often experience prolonged bereavement because they can’t put parameters around the death of their loved ones who died overseas and away from home, said Carla Goodwin, an Easton psychotherapist.

Page 2 of 2 - That’s why they often seek out other families who are stricken with similar tragedy.

“It’s the only way the families can put some logic and understanding around the death, because they weren’t there (when it happened),” Goodwin said.

Goodwin said she is currently counseling a military family from the region still grieving from their loss. Preach’s death “just re-triggered it all over again” for the family, she said.

For Monti, Preach’s death hit home for a variety of reasons.

Both his son and Preach graduated from Bridgewater-Raynham Regional High School.

Brianna Kelliher, Preach’s girlfriend, was a finalist last year for a scholarship Monti started in his son’s name, Monti said. Kelliher had written a scholarship essay about her boyfriend, who was about to be deployed to Afghanistan, he said.

“As soon as I saw the name, I knew who it was,” Monti said of Preach.

When she heard the news that a 22-year-old soldier from Leominster was killed in Iraq last week, Melida Arredondo said she began crying as thoughts of her late stepson, Alex, resurfaced.

“She was screaming in the bathroom, ‘Another one from home,’” Carlos Arredondo recalled.

The Arredondos plan to cook for Preach’s mother, Laurie Hayes of Bridgewater, and other family members when Hayes, who had been at a Texas military hospital, returns home.

Melida Arredondo said the couple plans on having supplies and food ready so the family doesn’t “have to worry about all those things.”

“We want them to realize that life will go on, and that we’re here to show them that,” she said.

On Jan. 21, Raynham dedicated the corner of North Main, South Main, Orchard and Pleasant streets in Jared Monti’s name.

His father, who is visiting Florida, planned to contact Preach’s family when he returns. “It brings up the old feelings again that never go away,” Monti said.